New York Fed Considering Its Next Chief

By Andrew Ross Sorkin, The New York Times

Monday, 12 Jan 2009 | 10:16 AM ETThe New York Times

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The board members of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York weighed who will become its next president over the weekend, interviewing candidates and meeting to discuss them, people briefed on the conversations said.

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Ever since Timothy F. Geithner, the current president of the New York Fed, was selected to become Treasury secretary last month, the board has been considering more than a dozen possibilities. With Mr. Geithner’s confirmation hearing scheduled for Thursday, the board is hoping to appoint a new president as soon as he is formally certified.

Among the short list of contenders with government experience are David H. McCormick, the Treasury Department’s under secretary for international affairs; Kevin M. Warsh, a Fed governor; William C. Dudley, the head of the New York Fed’s markets desk; and Terrence J. Checki, head of the New York Fed’s emerging markets and international affairs group.

The board is also considering a handful of Wall Street power players, including H. Rodgin Cohen, the chairman of Sullivan & Cromwell, and Paul Calello, the head of investment banking at Credit Suisse who worked for the Federal Reserve in the Monetary and Economic Policy Group in the mid-1980s.

It was unclear who was considered the front-runner. A spokesman for the Fed declined to comment.

Some of the candidates were first reported on The Wall Street Journal’s Web site.

One concern among the board members is the role that the various candidates played in the bailouts during the financial crisis, people briefed on the deliberations said. Virtually everyone on the list was involved in the marathon bailout weekends, either in a government role or working for one of the various banks seeking help.

For example, Mr. Calello’s firm represented Barclays in its failed deal with Lehman Brothers, and Mr. Cohen represented Lehman Brothers and later the American International Group.